I am disgusted with
liberal politics as usual. I am disgusted with the self-congratulations,
the self-gratification, the feeling of moral and intellectual superiority
voiced by liberal pundits and their sickeningly predictable, patent, self-important,
arrogant and superior-feeling followers. Is it enough to be happy that
people are throwing shoes at Bush? Are people so gratified with Bush-bashing
that they have forgotten that the entire capitalist system is on the brink
of collapse? Do they not wonder in disgust as their liberal Democratic
heroes work like mad to save the sinking ship? Shouldn't they wonder why
such repairs as they recommend come solely at the expense of working people
like themselves? Shouldn't the conclusions of leadership be more drastic?
Liberalism as it stands has no answers. No answers for the disaster that
faces us. Even Barack Obama stated that the usual list of remedies for
liberal economic reform is just about spent. Liberalism has nothing left,
or next to nothing. What it does have left will not fix what ails us.

Nevertheless, the Democratic electorate and their self-appointed pundits
are satisfied. Why, even the "radical" William Ayers, in an
interview with Chris Matthews, said that the liberal Democrats are suffering
from post-partum depression; because now, I suppose, they have born their
baby and there's nothing left to do but feed it. That's the extent of
"change" for them. As long as the "correct" attitudes
are expressed, they believe all is well. As long as the identity of the
president and the composition of Congress are fine by them, then everything
is fine by them. No matter that people are losing their jobs by the thousands,
that the same people losing their jobs are paying capitalists to
"fix" the economy, that workers in the auto industry will be
taken back to pre-union standards and nothing will be done for them other
than to watch them get screwed...no, just as long as the right attitudes
are in play, then all is well. If it weren't so damnable it would be hilarious.
But the delusions of the soft, identity-politics-driven liberal Democrats
are almost incredible. I haven't seen the likes of such credulity in some
time. Everyone is relieved because Bush has had a shoe thrown at him and
things are 'changing' soon, so they can all go back home and forget about
politics for a while. But that's all that the liberal Democrats wanted--the
laissez faire liberals just wanted to usher in the correct attitudes--toward
Bush, toward war, toward the environment, toward minorities, toward the
rest of the world.

Meanwhile, these
"remedies" for the workers and the economy at large are being
inaugurated by the very liberal Democrats that everyone elected to change
things. Oh, there will be changes. Changes in attitude toward the
poor, but not the end of poverty. Changes in attitude toward identity
groups, but not material changes in their lives. Changes in how people
are referred to, but not changes in the quality of their lives-other than
the "sacrifices" they will be expected to make. What sacrifices
will Wall Street moguls be expected to make? Notice how big finance was
bailed out without a hitch, big finance that produces NOTHING, while the
auto industry will not be bailed out, even after they conceded everything-on
the "behalf of" the workers? That should tell you quite clearly
what liberal Democrats are good for. Class warfare, but not the kind suggested
by Republicans. I'm sorry to have to say this, but since no one else is
saying it, I guess it must be up to me. The liberal Democrats have been
brought in for one reason and one reason only. They are there to soften
the blow, to deliver the bad news, to deliver the bad news in milder tones,
from a different identity standpoint, so that it's more acceptable-to
tell more people in milder tones that they are out of luck. The bad news
will simply have a different, more unlikely and thus acceptable bearer,
one that didn't enslave them, or lead them to war; or so they think.

Liberalism just
wants everyone to feel better about things, to feel that things are better
because, hey, we have a black president. That makes every liberal feel
better. I am not a liberal but even I feel better. (I'm a Marxist, which
is not liberal, left-, nor rightwing.) But I don't want to feel
better. That is, I don't want to feel better about things as they
are! I want things to actually be better. As Marx wrote about the
young Hegelians, they believed that change meant merely changing the consciousness
of the oppressed. Liberals, today's young Hegelians, are about changing
the consciousness of the oppressed. They are not about changing the conditions
that oppress them. Nothing could be clearer than that today. Nothing is
clearer than the fact that liberalism can offer nothing, or next to nothing.

Economic reform is
impossible under liberalism today because capitalism is failing. Capitalism
cannot offer concessions and reforms. That's what liberalism was generally
good for, so what is it good is it now? Instead of positive reform, the
likes that FDR, the self-proclaimed best friend of capitalism ushered
in, liberalism will now do the workers a favor by offering concessions
in their name. Thanks. Thanks for keeping afloat the system that oppresses
us. Thanks for bailing out a system, using our tax money, our public funds,
our wages, to screw us over further in the future. Thanks for "saving"
a system that will serve to cut our wages, destroy whatever savings we
may have by chance accrued, gut our retirement packages, and decimate
our health care systems. Thanks. Yesterday's New Deal is today's Raw
Deal.

Since liberalism
has nothing more to offer in terms of economic reform, what will it present
to us?

An endless parade
of feel-good identity politics and the "proper" attitudes-
toward Republicans and Bush, toward the environment, toward war, toward
minorities, toward "difference." Get ready for nothing but attitude,
nothing but sermons and admonishments for the 'bad' people, and self-congratulations
for the 'good' people. Such will be the fare of the day because liberalism
has nothing else!

Liberalism will now
inaugurate a new, fleeting era of good feelings and feel-good politics
aimed at making everyone feel equal. The key word here is "feel,"
because people will not actually be equal, except in the most abstract,
de jure sense. De facto, some people will be equally dispossessed
and a smaller number will be equally disconnected from the dispossessed.
But, alas, this feel-good moment will be fleeting, because it will be
outlasted by the economic disaster that liberalism cannot prevent or ameliorate.

But for the time
being, liberals will now sit back on their electoral laurels and enjoy
their feelings, not the least of which is their feeling of moral
and intellectual superiority. They have ushered in the "correct"
attitudes-toward religion, toward science, toward the environment, toward
minorities, toward homosexuality, toward race. First will come a season
of laudatory self-congratulations all around. The talk show hosts will
continue to knock each other out with pats on the backs for their proper,
correct, feel-good, self-satisfied feelings of moral and intellectual
superiority. They did it. They helped elect a black president. Identity
politics will be used, as usual, as a thin scrim to hide much deeper problems.
For those who heralded it--they will continue to consider themselves the
superior moral beings. Bravo!

But as Marx wrote,
the new Hegelians (equivalent to today's liberals) think that people are
enslaved by their consciousness and that to liberate people, we only need
to liberate people from false consciousness---from ideology, from religion,
from retrograde attitudes about science, evolution, sexual orientation,
minorities, difference, race, etc. All we need is to have the right ideas
and everything else will be fine. But people are not enslaved by consciousness,
ideas, or attitudes. No, people are enslaved by the material conditions
that produce their consciousness, ideas, and attitudes. If these material
conditions do not change, or get worse, their feelings will return to
the bad kind that liberals seek to change through their attitude adjustment
programs.

This brings me to
Marx's famous pronouncement about religion, which is so poorly understood.
Never did Marx condemn people for being religious. Such a condemnation
is anathema to a truly humanistic understanding of religion. Denigration
of religious people is a denigration of people, and thus, anti-humanistic.
Unlike snobs, who smugly denigrate religious people (Christopher Hitchens,
Richard Dawkins, and Bill Maher come to mind), Marx never condemned people
for being religious. What Marx does condemn are the conditions
of a society that make religion necessary:

Religious suffering
is at the same time an expression of real suffering and a protest against
real suffering. Religion is the sign of the oppressed creature, the
sentiment of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.
It is the opium of the people (Marx, Introduction to Contribution
to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right).

Religion exists as
it does because people are oppressed, because "hope" for a future,
for goodness in some other realm, in some other order of being, for freedom
from oppression, is all that they have. Religion is a displacement of
equity, prosperity, and justice onto a realm outside of the human realm,
because the human realm lacks such qualities. To denigrate religion is
to denigrate human desire for all that religion displaces. But the fact
that people can imagine such goodness, such justice, such benevolence
and freedom testifies to the fact that human society can be all that it
lacks. As such, the existence of religion disproves the cynics who claim
that "human nature" simply involves selfishness, nastiness,
competitive individualism, and so forth. Likewise, a true humanist doesn't
work hard to eradicate religion. A true humanist works to eradicate the
conditions that make religion necessary. In other words, a true humanist
condemns liberals more than religions, because liberalism permits such
oppression as makes religion necessary.

So what do I recommend
instead of liberalism, which has recommended nothing but an attitude change?
For starters, I recommend a nationalization of all major industries with
assets of over 10 billion-owned by the people, not bailed out by the tax
payer and only to be used for more profit and exploitation of the very
same people who paid to bail the bastards out. The bailouts are all so
sickening I can barely speak of them. But their support by the Democrats
should be the final tip-off to anyone really seeking change that the Democrats
are not and will never be the ones to bring it about. I recommend finally
dismissing the illusion that Democrats offer anything other than attitudes
and words. This comes at a strange time, you may say, just when liberalism
seems to be more than it ever was. Well, this is a last hurrah, I tell
you, a last gasp at seeming, and it will soon be clear that things are
not as they seem.